Obi and Dexter

1.Truth: Some loss never leaves you. I will never stop missing Kelly. I will never not feel sad that Obi and Dexter are gone. The memory of losing them lives in my body, and at the most unexpected times it gets triggered, washes over me as if I’m in the very first moments of it all over again.

2. Truth: Even though it hurts, it’s better than the alternative. Maggie Doyne, who just lost her 18 month old son, posted on Facebook yesterday, “The only thing worse than losing Ravi would have been to never have known him at all.” I can’t stop thinking about it.

3. Truth: The pain you feel when you lose someone is equal in measure to how much you loved them. This is the good news, and the bad news.

One wish: That while we are here, we love, and when we go, we know that we were loved.

Lory State Park, image by Eric

1. Truth: I walk through my life carrying so much longing. It makes me try so hard, makes me heavy and tired but I can’t put it down.

2. Truth: This longing is the source of my suffering. I’m not telling you anything new — this is the 2nd Noble Truth of Buddhism, “the cause of suffering is attachment.”

3. Truth: I don’t know how much time I have left, but I hope it’s enough. Enough time to do something of benefit, enough time to learn how to let go of all the things I can’t do or have or be.

One wish: May it be enough.